It appears that being a teacher really is no guarantee that you're not a fucking moron, as demonstrated by the National Union Teachers. They want to ban the Ministry of Defence from giving talks to students on a potential career in the military, because they use "misleading propaganda".

Apparently they don't give a true enough picture of life in the armed forces. Bollocks. Besides, any half-intelligent person would, y'know, check up on the details before they took a job.

And they really did come out with some complete bollocks:

Any one who can say this with a straight face really is too stupid to be a teacher. Even a PE teacher.

It isn't up to teachers to decide what careers their students should consider. It is their duty as educators to provide all the information to their students to enable them to make their own informed and intelligent choices - not just the ones their teachers would prefer them to make.

Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach. And those who can't teach go to NUT conferences and pass idiotic Leftist motions like this.

UPDATE: Two teachers object to the NUT's statements.

A government-backed report had just declared that:

Maybe it would create a "fairer" system. But it would also create a system that was made to fail. And fail miserably.

The comprehensive - aka no selection - educational system is the reason that "[a]lmost half of leading companies failed to find suitable graduates to fill vacancies last year despite record numbers of students leaving university" and that "[l]eading universities complained this month they have to give new students crash courses in literacy and numeracy - and even extend degree courses by a year - because many leave school lacking basic skills."

No selection - externally or internally - means that children don't get the education they need, as different children have different intelligence levels and speed of learning, and as such need to be grouped together in order to raise the effectiveness of their teaching and learning. This sort of system wouldn't do anything to help the children themselves, but in fact ruin their education. This is unfair on them.

Thus, ending selection in education may be "fairer", but it certainly isn't fair. On anyone.

The proportion of middle class children going to university has grown under Labour:

So charging loads of money for students to go to university has increased the proportion of middle class children going to university. Who'd've thunk it?! After all, when it's going to cost so much, many "working class" people would prefer to just earn now. Especially considering the devaluing of the worth of a degree and the continual rise in the cost of getting one.

Middle class parents will be far more willing and able to financially support their offspring, and the extra loan that those whose parents don't earn much can get doesn't really help - since it has to be paid back as well.

So Labour have driven an increase in the middle-class domination of universities. Most certainly not what they had in mind.

Cross-posted at Educational Conscription

Rather than the educational conscription proposed by the government that myself and the others [such as Fabian Tassano, Surreptitious Evil, and Devil's Kitchen] who write the Educational Conscription group blog are constantly arguing against, it has now been suggested that children should have the opportunity to leave school at 14 - by the head of the UK's biggest education authority, no less.

His point is that, very simply, some children are not academically gifted and are not suited to classroom teaching and learning - and as such would benefit far more from apprenticeships.

The response of the NUT that the earnings of those who stay on and get qualifications is "much higher" than those who have "simply left school very early and gone on to do some very specific training." Yes, it may well be. But those who leave school at 14 will not be the kind of people who benefit from classroom learning or those who are likely to be suited to do the jobs that require high qualifications. They are the people essential to our society - plumbers, electricians, builders etc. - without whom our modern society is screwed. That the NUT believe that qualifications are essential and required in order to live a useful and productive life betrays their love of the testing regime.

Not everyone can have high qualifications and great high paid jobs. And not everyone is suited to them. It's a simple fact of life.

However, at the very least, children shouldn't be allowed to leave school at 14 unless they have an apprenticeship to go to. I'm not entirely convinced by the idea that children should be able to leave school so early, but it is certainly far better than forcing them to stay there for longer. At least they then have the choice to make, the choice which this government seems determined to take away from 16-18 year olds.

Cross-posted at Educational Conscription. Please go there to comment on this post.

Soon there's going to be no time left in schools for actual education, as ministers are to announce this week that every child is to have "five hours of cultural learning and activity every week" during the school day. Add this to be extra PE time schools are also supposed to give, and the amount of time for actual teaching and learning will suffer massively from the lack of time they actually get.

Even though school tables keep showing better results, and the annual increase in GCSE and A-level results, Britain is dropping in comparison with other countries:

This decline can at least partly be put down to just the "tyranny of the testing regime" which has sprouted massively during the last decade. Tests and targets don't foster good teaching or a good education system. So even with billions of pounds being thrown at the problem, bugger all has really been achieved by it - and in fact the opposite in comparison with other countries.

What this latest education gimmick that Labour will introduce shows that they don't really care about actual education and learning - which is the real point of school - but about making change for changes sake. Children don't need five hours of "cultural learning and activity" every week, but they do need more actual education and teaching. And it is just this lack of teaching that gives them their arguments for educational conscription.

Source: The Guardian, The Times, BBC, The Telegraph

Well, isn't it rather common sense that headteachers should sack "sub-standard" teachers?

The problem, however, is how can you be sure that the next teacher will be any better - or even if you will get one? Teaching is hardly the number one career choice for most people, after all. And even those who do join the profession, many then leave.

Bad teachers should be weeded out for the good of our children and out country's future. But having no teachers is even worse than having a bad teacher. Poor teachers should be removed wherever possible. But it isn't always possible.

Source: BBC

In addition to my diatribe yesterday on educational conscription, something has just occured to me - this law will apply only in England. Only English children will have to stay in school until 18. Only English children will be deprived of their liberties and their freedom.

As such, when this law comes before Parliament, not one MP for a Scottish or Welsh constituency had better vote. This does not apply in their constsituencies, so I do not want to see them force two years of extra schooling onto English children but not those in Scotland and Wales.

That they even could do it illustrates the issues with our current devolution system.

Cross-posted at Educational Conscription.

Regular readers will know that I don't normally swear [mainly because I just could never match the peerless swearblogging of Devil's Kitchen or Mr Eugenides as you can see here], but this warrants a good number of swear words.

Oh, for fuck's sake. What is it with this stupid fucking government that makes them think that making delinquents stay in school for two years longer will actually help them in any way? I mean, the kids who leave school at sixteen tend to be the same little shits who hold everyone else back by mucking around in class. They're the non-academically gifted kids who just don't want to stay in school for longer, but want to go and do something useful to them and their future.

This idea is a fucking stupid one, thought up by a bunch of statist cunts who think two more years of compulsory schooling will make up for their failings in their last eleven. Bollocks will it. All it will do is hold back those who do want to work, as the twats who piss around in class will still be there disrupting everyone else. When those bastards left after GCSEs, school became far better as those who were left had chosen to do so, and so put in more work and pissed around in class less.

Frankly, there are no benefits to making kids stay in school until they are eighteen. At all. All it will do is cause mass truancy, and then criminalise those truants for having the gall to decide what is best for them!

But ah you say, "under the plans pupils would not have to continue with academic lessons but would be required to receive training." But who the fuck going to provide this training? What is it going to be in? What purpose is it to have? How are you going to make them attend? The practical problems in this are fucking immense - and I certainly wouldn't trust any government - and certainly not this bunch of cunts - to implement such a scheme with any real thought to the practical considerations.

Apprenticeships and training for school-leavers already exist. Companies take on apprentices and train them up already. The difference is that the apprentices they have have chosen - at least to a far greater degree - to go into this trade. Thus, those who want to stay in school already can and do - after all, it's free unlike university. And those who want to get into a trade can and do so as well. And the ones who don't will just be a distraction to those in school and just lower the educational standard on the country or just be useless little shits if forced into an apprenticeship.

When it comes down to it, not everyone can do a skilled job anyway. It simply isn't possible. Someone needs to clean the streets and the toilets, stock the supermarket shelves, and wait tables, etc. after all. Every single job has to be done by someone. The best way to get 16-18 year-olds to get off their fat lazy arses and either get a job or stay in school is to cut their dole. Say they can only get half or even not a single fucking penny until they are 18.

Conscripting 16-18 year-olds into longer educational is a seriously fucking stupid idea. Instead of pumping money into educating them when they don't want to learn anything, put it into adult education for when they have decided that they're fed up of doing a shit job and do want to learn. When it comes down to it, you can't physically make every 16-18 year-old stay in school. it's not possible, and is just absurd to even suggest, yet alone include in the Queen's Speech!

So, Blinky Balls and Cyclops Brown, and the other authoritarian statist cunts in the government - fuck off. Just fuck right off.

For more on this subject, visit the group blog Educational Conscription.

University courses don't "resemble part-time employment". Whilst students are lazy, and few do what really is "the equivalent of a full-time job", it is nowhere near as easy as they are suggesting:

That there is a difference is the number of hours spent working on various university schemes is obvious. Some such as medicine require long hours to cover what needs to be done, while others just don't need so long.

What this ignores is that being a university student isn't a job. Students don't - and can't - do the 9-5 working day. As a student, you can and often do work at all times of the day. You also don't have weekends "off" as there is still work that you can and possibly should do. There is no such thing as a real holiday - between terms there is always essays to write, for example, and there is always more reading around the subject that can be done. There is no such thing as time off when you are a student.

Some courses require lots of direct tutoring and others very little - but they require more unsupervised work. The time you spend working on most courses also varies week-on-week, more so when lots of independent study is required. Some weeks I could have worked just a couple of hours or so a day. But others, especially when essay deadlines neared, I could spend up to 10 hours or more working, with pretty much just toilet and meal breaks all day - and this could occur for several weeks in a row.

It also misses out the very simple fact that most students have to actually earn money as well. You either have a part-time job during term time or work a hell of a lot during your "holidays". You may think a two/three month "summer" is idyllic, but when you have to use that time to earn enough money to live on for the next year [as the Student Loan will only just about cover accommodation - and that's if you're lucky] it really isn't.

But concentrating simply on the hours spent studying ignores what university is really about. It is more than just a place where you get a degree, it is about getting life experience as well. If it was just about getting a qualification, it wouldn't fulfil the needs of the nation at all. Uni is about developing social skills as well - and that is where the hundreds of clubs and societies that exist on university campuses come in. Extra-curricular activities are as important to do as the academic study, and can be as important as the degree in getting a job. They are certainly at least as important for personal development.

Anyone who considers the number of hours spent studying to be the axis along which degrees are classified is an idiot. Going to university is about far, far more than just a degree. And in many ways the degree itself is worth less - certainly at the moment where there are so many graduates - than the non-academic work you do at university that is not included in the study. being a student on no course "resembles part-time employment". The level fluctuates, but it sure as hell isn't just "part-time".

Source: The Telegraph

Lunatics running the asylum? No, even more absurd - school children writing their own tests.

What the hell? Let's read that again: "Pupils should mark their own classwork and decide what their school tests should cover". What? Why?

This is quite possibly the most stupid thing I have ever read. Have they actually thought it through? Obviously not.

Our education system is in enough trouble as it is right now, which the dumbing down of GCSEs and A-levels to extent where more a than a quarter of A-levels are As, and nearly one in five GCSE grades are A or A*. SO this idea really isn't going to improve confidence in the education system at all. In fact, if it ever comes into practice we might as well just give everyone an A and get it over with.

Can the idiots who devised this even remember being at school or even in education at all? Have they completely forgotten the simple fact that all school children will do anything not to work - or at least work hard. If it is the pupils themselves who pick the exam questions, A-level maths will consist of questions on the level of 2 + 2 = ?.

The QCA report said that:
That ignores the very simple fact I mentioned above - school children don't want to work. I always found this sort of "self-assessment" of work as pointless and certainly not constructive. It doesn't help to pretty much waste time going through old work - it is far more useful to get it marked and appropriate feedback written on it. The teacher then knows what areas need work. But trying to "engage learners with the quality of their work" like this is never going to work. Ever.

The dumbing down of education needs to stop and be reversed - this is going in very much the wrong direction. It truly does take us to within one step of rubber-stamping all exam papers with an A.

Source: The Telegraph

Why is there money available for this? Why should money be available to be allocated based on race? Extra money should be allocated to schools to help with kids who need it, not aimed at specific racial groups.

Quite frankly, it smacks of racism when money is specifically allocated in this way. It encourages segregation and marks certain children out as different from the rest of their class. Money simply shouldn't be allocated based on the race of the children.

Allocating money based on ability and attainment of children is fine - as is selecting by ability and not race - and beneficial to them all. But giving a school money to spend just on a specific minority sure as hell isn't.

Source: Watford Observer

Who is it that is discriminating - universities or the state school students?

This story is incomplete, and shows how statistics can easily be abused. It says that only 57.9% of Cambridge students and 53.7% of Oxford students come from state schools, leading John Denahm to claim that they are ignoring state school applicants. But what percentage of the applicants to Oxford and Cambridge came from state school pupils? It is the difference between them that matters.

It might be more of a "dog bites man" story to say that "Poor biased against Universities" rather than "man bites dog" type of headline John Denham provided today, but without the other statistics I mentioned above, the ones we are given are meaningless. Just because only 58% of Cambridge's students come from state schools isn't a bad thing in and of itself. If only 58% of it's applicants were from state schools, then it's probably about right. No university is going to deliberately choose less intelligent students simply down to class snobbery. They want the best and brightest that they can get, and since they receive no more money whether or not they take students from state schools, that's who they're going to pick - the best of the applicants.

To say that they are biased against state school students because they form only a slight majority of the students they take in is absurd. They are going to take the best applicants - whoever they be, wherever they are from.

Source: The Telegraph

Gender is not the real classroom divide, claims Equal Opportunities Commission:

In fact, they say that instead of helping to narrow to gap
So, predictably, it's class [and race] that is the source of all inequality:
Except, really, it's not because of their class or race that certain kids fall behind, it is either because they are not as intelligent as others or because they don't put the work in.

Class, race, and gender are not the real classroom divides. Ability and application are. This may be reflected along gender, race, and class lines, because they don't exist because of them. They are a symptom, not a cause. Instead of trying to focus on one group, however defined, it would be far better to encourage all school children to work harder, and to encourage their parents to encourage them as well.

General ability and the extent to which that is applied to school work are the divides within the classroom. Nothing else causes them, but they can be seen as areas where extra work needs to be done in order for them to reach their potential. It's not because they are working class, male, or black that are low in the class, but because they either don't have the ability and/or aren't applying it.

Source: The Times

This is never going to work. It can't work, because it is based on a false premise. Faith schools don't "foster(ing) understanding between different religions and promot[e] integration and community cohesion" but the precise opposite.

I dislike faith schools. All faith schools, whatever religion they are based in. There is no doubt that they promote - most likely unconsciously - a segregationist view of the world, 'them' and 'us'. However, I don't mind parents choosing to send their children to a faith school - so long as they pay for it. Taxpayer's money should not go towards any faith school.

There can be no doubt that religious schools do foster a lack of understanding of other religions and cultures. Most modern organised religions deem that they are "the one true path" and that every other religion in the world is wrong, and this in undoubtedly going to come over in some sense at least through the education they give. It is segregation - only people of a particular faith go to a faith school. It means that there is little or no mixing of children of different [nominal] faiths at the age in which it is most important that they do.

Religion/faith is a personal thing. It requires a personal devotion to and acceptance of a creed and certain supernatural being(s). It should not be forced onto kids, and certainly shouldn't be paid for by the taxpayer. If you follow a religion and want your children to do so as well, then you should be prepared to either pay for that education, or give it yourself or through your religious institution.

Britain is a secular country, with only 53% of the population even calling themselves "Christian", let alone actually going to Church at all. This should - must - be reflected in the state education system. Religion should not form part of any over-arching structure in a school, any more so than race should. No school that accepts state funding should be able to belong to any faith or have an educational doctrine based in one. This does not mean that teachers shouldn't be religious. The best teacher I had, for five years [Years 9-13], was a devout Christian, and is now actually an Assistant Pastor. But he left his religiousness at the door whilst he taught.

Religious schools are the bane of any multi-cultural society, and must not be funded by the state.

Source: The Times

If you live in England, get ready to write yet another blank cheque for Scotland...

So, basically, if you're English [or Welsh] you have to pay tuition fees if you study in Scotland, but not if you're Scottish or from anywhere else in the EU? Thus, English taxpayers are funding Scottish and European student's education - but not that of their own kids.

No matter if Wendy Alexander [Scottish Labour leader] thinks that the English shouldn't complain about Scotland living off of us, we will. Especially when the abuse of our taxes extends to such a level as £1,236 more on every person in Scotland.

As much as Salmond may not like it [politically, though obviously not financially], Scotland is still part of the UK. As such, to discriminate in such a way against students from England is utterly wrong.

This is yet another example of the educational apartheid in Britain. Scottish students shouldn't get university - or any other - education on a different financial basis, such as no Student Loans for Scottish students, to that which exists in the rest of the United Kingdom. We are one state, under one Government, even if Salmond disagrees even on that level with his pronouncement of the "rebranding" of the Scottish Executive as the Scottish Government with £100,000 of English money.

Has Salmond never heard of equality - as in where everyone is equal? Apparently not.

Source: The Telegraph

The GCSE results came out yesterday, and showed yet another rise.

So just under one in five GCSE result was an A or A* - less than the quarter of A grades at A-level, but still almost absurdly high. But even though the number of people getting five "good" GCSEs (A*-C) has risen, and is rising, if you include core subjects such as maths and science in the evaluation, the number is falling.
So even though the grades suggest a rise, the reality is far different. This is certainly not a good thing.

A good basic understanding and ability to apply English and maths is essential in the modern world. An understanding of science is also necessary in many ways. You could probably discount a foreign language from being an essential GCSEs, really, however. I can remember very little from my GCSE German [I got a C] - about all I can recall is that "fahrt" means journey, and that "gespeilen" is the verb "to play".

Getting five A*-C GCSEs without English and Maths being included does not count as "good". They are the two most basic subjects, and a good GCSE in them is required by most employers. The number of people who are not getting A*-C in these two subjects is horrifying. It needs to be corrected - starting with the statistics.

Sources: BBC, The Times

School children are to be "tagged":

This is just yet another step along the way towards a surveillance state. Tracking where your children are through technology in their clothes sounds like a good idea, because then you'll never lose them, always know where they are etc. But it is just one small step away from implanting tracking devices in bodies at birth, and thus it always being known where you are.

What sort of world are we living in where constant tracking can be seen as a good thing? The implications for privacy are enormous. Those who argue that if you don't do anything wrong, you don't have anything to worry about are just fooling themselves. The idea of tagging the elderly has been raised before, and now the idea of tagging kids. Nest they'll be after the rest of us.

I don't want Big Brother knowing where I am all day every day. Why would they want to know, and what good would it do them? What is the real point of them? The very small benefits they may bring in "security" mean nothing against the invasion of privacy that accompanies it.

Sources: The Telegraph, The Guardian

School leavers don't have good enough levels of literacy and numeracy for employers:

I oh so very much doubt that this is a new phenomenon. I am sure that this has been happening for as long as there have been schools and companies who hire the people from them. This just adds to the arguments against educational conscription [visit the group blog dedicated to arguing against it here]. If two years of voluntary extra schooling can't make teenagers have acceptable levels of literacy and numeracy, why on earth would two years of compulsory schooling have any benefits? The only good thing employers have to say about school leavers comes from skills developed whilst outside of school.

[Quite why they're called the three "Rs" when they start with an R, a W and an A - a fact which any 10 year old could probably tell you - has always confused me. It just makes no sense.]

Source: BBC